• you never, never use the East Main and
East Park bridges to cross the Intracoastal Canal, and the sight of a lowering
crossbar with red liglits blinking automatically raises your blood pressure

• you sometimes refer to the Houma Air Base
as the "blimp base"

• the men in your family keep what amounts
to an arsenal of guns in your house, and none of it is for protection but
instead all for huntîng

• your parents or grandparents pronounced
it the "Houma Coo-ree-ay". or even occasionally still refer
to the local newspaper as the Terrebonne Press

• you feel a twinge of nostalgia when you
drive past the vacant area on West Main that was once the Houma Drive In

• you still hesitantly sniff the air at Highway
311 near Southdown (especially when cool weather begins in October and
November) where the mill used to fill the atmosphere with its characteristic
odor

• you never refer to the streets as Park
or Main, but instead always precede the names by the specific designations
East and West, except for the stretch downtown from Canal to Dunn, which
is Main Street to you

• you don't find it strange to hear a local
say "hose pipe" for "hose"

• the terms up the bayou and down
the bayou hold directional, not cultural, connotations for you

• you occasionally head absentmindedly for
the red brick building across from the courthouse on Main Street when you
have to mail a letter

• your conversation ever includes referrals
to the "girls' school" and the "boys' school"

• you have ever sensed a phantom whiff of
popcorn wafting from the First National Bank drive-in area where the Bijou
Theater stood on Main Street

• mention of the name Chacahoula makes your
mouth water for fried chicken or frog legs